Band:	Paara
Album:	Riitti
Style:	Black metal
Release date:	February 2018

01. Viimeinen Virta
02. Hurmeen Hauta
03. Suon Sydän
04. Kuiskaus Pimeästä

Instead of surfing the experimental and psychedelic wave of black metal coming lately from Finland, Paara choose to look back upon the 1990s and early 2000s, especially upon bands like Emperor, Moonsorrow, and early Enslaved, spicing it in abundance with melodic overtones. Sure, it's a rehash of olden days we already heard, but is it a good rehash?

Paara constructed Riiti in a similar vein to their debut, Yön Olevainen Puoli, once again four tracks, but this time they took a risky approach and positioned the longest track, which is over 15 minutes in length, as the opener. Well, it worked on Eld and Dar De Duh, and it works here as well. "Viimeinen Virta" encompasses everything great about this record, even though it does lose just a bit of steam during the following two tracks, but it being a 40-minute-long record, one can barely notice. The closing track does an excellent job of ending the album on a high note, in a climatic fashion.

Rather than focusing on hazy atmospheres and grainy production, Paara focus more on the melodic side, occasionally spicing the riff stampede with guitar solos. While most of the album is guitar-centric as far as the instrumentation goes, occasional Emperor-esque synths do come into play. Leaving apart the instrumentation, Riiti's strongest quality is the vocal work, switching between three vocalists in different styles. Hahtezan's vocals are a new addition to Paara's sound that their debut lacked.

Constantly changing paces and vocal approaches to keep the album from getting stale, Paara bring into play both the classic razor-sharp tremolo picking, the already mentioned melodic solos, folkish tones, and atmospheric passages. While not pushing any boundaries, Riiti is beautifully crafted, it doesn't overstay its welcome, and it is varied enough not to feel like a cheap rehash.